The Tenure of Kings and Magistrates, by John Milton

The Text

A Reproduction of the First Edition, with Variants from the Second Edition.

The Tenure of Kings and Magistrates: Proving, That it is Lawfull, and hath been held so through all Ages, for any
who have the Power, to call to account a Tyrant, or wicked KING, and after due conviction, to depose and put him to
death; if the ordinary MAGISTRATE have neglected or deny’d to doe it. And that they, who of late, so much blame
Deposing, are the Men that did it themselves. The Author, J. M. London, Printed by Matthew Simmons,
at the Gilded Lyon in Aldersgate Street, 1649.

The Tenure of Kings and Magistrates.

If Men within themselves would be govern’d by reason, and not
generally give up their understanding to a double tyrannie, of Custome from without, and blind affections within, they
would discerne better, what it is to favour and uphold the Tyrant of a Nation. But
being slaves within doores, no wonder that they strive so much to have the public State conformably govern’d
to the inward vitious rule, by which they govern themselves. For indeed none can
love freedom heartilie, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but licence; which never hath more scope or
more indulgence then under Tyrants. Hence is it, that Tyrants are not oft
offended, nor stand much in doubt of bad men, as being all naturally servile; but in whom vertue and true
worth most is eminent, them they feare in earnest, as by right their
Masters, against them lies all thir hatred and suspicion. Consequentlie neither doe bad men hate Tirants, but have been
alwaies readiest with the falsifi’d names of Loyalty and Obedience, to colour over their base
compliances. And although sometimes for shame, and when it comes to their owne grievances, of purse especially, they
would seeme good patriots, and side with the better cause, yet when others for the deliverance of their Countrie, endu’d with fortitude and Heroick vertue to feare
nothing but the curse writt’n against those That doe the work of the
Lord negligently, would goe on to remove, not onely the calamities and thraldomes of a people, but the roots and
causes whence they spring, streight these men, and sure helpers at need,
as if they hated onely the miseries but not the mischiefes, after they have juggl’d
and palter’d with the World, bandied and borne armes against
their King, devested him, disanointed him, nay, curs’d him all over in their pulpits and their pamphlets, to the ingaging of sincere and
reall men, beyond what is possible or honest to retreat from, not onely turne revolters from those principles, which
onely could at first move them, but lay the staine of disloyaltie, and worse, on those proceedings, which are the
necessarie consequences of their owne former actions; nor dislik’d by themselves, were they manag’d to the intire advantages of their owne Faction; not considering the while that he
toward whom they boasted new fidelitie, counted them accessory; and by
those Statutes and Laws which they so impotently brandish against others,
would have doom’d them to a traytors death, for what they have done alreadie. ‘Tis true, that most men are apt anough
to civill Wars and commotions as a noveltie, and for a flash, hot and
active; but through sloth or inconstancie, and weakness of
spirit either fainting ere their owne pretences, though never so just, be halfe attain’d, or through an
inbred falshood and wickednesse, betray oft times to destruction with themselves, men of noblest temper join’d with
them for causes, which they in their rash undertakings were not capable of.1
If God and a good cause give them Victory, the prosecution whereof for the most part, inevitably drawes after it the
alteration of Lawes, change of Goverment, downfall of princes with their
Families; then comes the task to those Worthies which are the soule of that Enterprize, to bee swett and labour’d out
amidst the throng and noises of vulgar and irrationall men. Some
contesting for privileges, customes, formes, and old intanglement of
iniquitie, their gibrish Lawes, though the badge of thir ancient slavery.
Others who have beene fiercest against their Prince, under the notion of a Tyrant, and no meane incendiaries of the
Warre against him, when God out of his Providence and high disposall hath deliver’d him into the hand of brethren, on a
suddaine and in a new garbe of Allegiance, which their doings have long since cancell’d; they plead for him, pity him, extoll him, protest against
those that talke of bringing him to the tryall of Justice, which is the Sword of God, superiour to all
mortall things, in whose hand soever by apparent signes his testified wil is to put it. But certainely, if we consider
who and what they are, on a suddaine grown so pitifull, wee may conclude, their pitty can be no true and Christian
commiseration, but either levitie and shallownesse of minde, or else a carnall admiring of that worldly pompe and
greatness, from whence they see him fall’n; or rather lastly a dissembl’d and seditious pity, fain’d of industry to beget new commotions.1
As for mercy, if it bee to a Tyrant, under which name they themselves have cited
him so oft in the hearing of God, of Angels, and the holy Church assembl’d, and there charg’d him with the
spilling of more innocent blood by farre, then ever Nero did,
undoubtedly the mercy which they pretend, is the mercy of wicked men; and their
mercies, wee read, are cruelties; hazarding the welfare of a whole Nation, to have sav’d one, whom so oft
they have tearm’d Agag; and villifying the blood of many Jonathans, that have sav’d
Israel; insisting with much nicenesse on the
unnecessariest clause of their Covnant1; wherein the feare of change, and the absurd contradiction of a flattering hostilitie had hamperd
them, but not scrupling to give away for complements, to an implacable
revenge, the heads of many thousand Christians more.

Another sort there is, who comming in the course of these affairs, to
have thir share in great actions, above the forme of Law or Custome, at least to give thir voice and approbation, begin
to swerve, and almost shiver at the Majesty and grandeur of som noble deed, as if they were newly enter’d into a great
sin; disputing presidents, formes and circumstances, when the
Commonwealth nigh perishes for want of deeds in substance, don with just and faithfull expedition. To these I wish
better instruction, and vertue equall to their calling; the former of which, that is to say, Instruction, I shall
endeavour, as my dutie is, to bestow on them; and exhort them not to startle
from the just and pious resolution of adhering with all their assistance2 to the present Parlament and Army, in the glorious
way wherein Justice and Victorie hath set them; the onely warrants, through all ages, next under immediate
Revelation, to exercise supreame power in those proceedings, which hitherto appeare equall to what hath been don in any
age or Nation heretofore justly or magnanimouslie. Nor let them be discourag’d or deterr’d by any new Apostate Scar crowes, who under show of giving counsell, send out
their barking monitories and memento’s, emptie of ought else but
the spleene of a frustrated Faction . For how can that pretended counsell
bee either sound or faithfull, when they that give it, see not for madnesse and vexation of their ends lost, that
those Statutes and Scriptures which both falsly and scandalously, they
wrest against their Friends and Associates, would by sentence
of the common adversarie fall first and heaviest upon their owne heads. Neither let milde and tender dispositions be
foolishly softn’d from their dutie and perseverance with the unmasculine Rhetorick
of any puling Priest or Chaplain, sent as a friendly Letter of advice, for fashion-sake in private, and
forthwith publish’t by the Sender himselfe, that wee may know how much of friend there was in it, to cast an odious
envie upon them, to whom it was pretended to be sent in charitie. Nor let any man be deluded by either the ignorance or
the notorious hypocrisie and self-repugnance of our dancing Divines, who
have the conscience and the boldnesse to come with Scripture in their mouthes, gloss’d and fitted for thir turnes with a double contradictory sense, transforming the sacred
veritie of God to an Idol with two faces, looking at once two several ways; and with the same quotations to charge
others, which in the same case they made serve to justifie themselves For while the hope to bee made Classic and Provinciall Lords led them on, while pluralities greas’d them thick and deepe, to the shame and scandall of Religion, more then
all the Sects and Heresies they exclaime against, then to fight against the Kings person, and no lesse a Party of his
Lords and Commons, or to put force upon both the Houses, was good, was lawfull, was no resisting of Superiour powers;
they onely were powers not to be resisted, who countenanc’d the good and punish’t the evill. But now that thir censorious domineering is not suffer’d to be universall, truth and conscience to be freed, Tithes
andPluralities to be no more, though competent allowance provided, and the warme
experience of large gifts, and they so good at taking them; yet now to
exclude and seize on1 impeach’t Members, to bring Delinquents without exemption to a faire Tribunall by the common Nationall Law
against murder, is now to be no lesse then Corah, Dathan and
Abiram . He who but erewhile in the pulpits was a cursed
Tyrant, an enemie to God and Saints, laden with all the innocent blood spilt in three Kingdomes, and so to
bee fought against, is now, though nothing penitent or alter’d from his
first principles, a lawfull Magistrate, a Sovrane Lord, the Lords
Annointed, not to be touch’d, though by themselves imprison’d
. As if this onely were obedience, to preserve the meere uselesse bulke of his person, and that onely in prison, not in
the field, and to disobey his commands, denie him his dignitie and office, every where to resist his power but where
they thinke it onely surviving in thir owne faction.

No man who knows ought, can be so stupid to deny that all men naturally were
borne free, being the image and resemblance of God himselfe,
and were by privilege above all the creatures, borne to command and not
to obey: and that they livd so,1 till from the root of Adams transgression, falling among themselves to doe wrong and violence, and
foreseeing that such courses must needs tend to the destruction of them all, they
agreed by common league to bind each other from mutual injury, and joyntly to defend themselves against any
that gave disturbance or opposition to such agreement. Hence came Citties, Townes and Common-wealths. And because no
faith in all was found sufficiently binding, they saw it needfull to ordaine some authoritie, that might restraine by
force and punishment what was violated against peace and common right. This autoritie and power of self-defence and
preservation being originally and naturally in every one of them, and unitedly in them all, for ease, for order, and
least each man should be his owne partial judge, they communicated and deriv’d either to one, whom for the eminence of his wisdom and integritie they chose above the rest, or to more then one whom
they thought of equal deserving: the first was calld a King; the other Magistrates . Not to be thir Lords and Maisters
(though afterward those names in som places were giv’n voluntarily to such as had bin authors of inestimable good to
the people) but, to be thir Deputies and Commissioners, to execute, by vertue of thir intrusted power, that justice
which else every man by the bond of nature and of Cov’nant must have executed for himselfe, and for one another. And to
him that shall consider well why among free persons, one man by civill right should beare autority and jurisdiction
over another, no other end or reason can be imaginable. These for a while governd well, and with much equitie decided
all things at thir owne arbitrement: till the temptation of such a power
left absolute in thir hands, perverted them at length to injustice and partialitie. Then did they, who now by tryall
had found the danger and inconveniences of committing arbitrary power to any, invent
Lawes either fram’d, or consented to by all, that should confine and limit the autority of whom they chose
to govern them: that so man of whose failing they had proof, might no more rule over them, but law and reason
abstracted as much as might be from personal errors and frailties.1 When
this would not serve but that the Law was either not executed, or misapply’d they were constraind from that time, the
onely remedy left them, to put conditions and take Oaths from all Kings and Magistrates at thir first instalment to doe impartial justice by Law: who upon those termes and no other, receav’d Allegeance from the people, that is to say, bond or Covnant to obey them in execution of those Lawes which they the people had themselves made, or assented to . And this oft times with
express warning, that if the King or Magistrate prov’d unfaithfull to his trust, the people would be disingag’d. They
added also Counselors and Parlaments, not to be onely at his beck, but with him or without him, at set times, or all times, when any
danger threatn’d to have care of the public safety. Therefore saith Claudius
Sesell2, a French Statesman, The Parlament was set as a
bridle to the King; which I instance rather3, because that Monarchy is
granted by all to be farre more absolute then ours. That this and the rest of what hath hitherto been spok’n is most
true, might be copiously made appeare throughout all Stories, Heathen and Christian; eev’n of those Nations where Kings
and Emperours have sought meanes to abolish all ancient memory of the peoples right by their encroachments and
usurpations. But I spare long insertions4, appealing to the German, French, Italian, Arragonian, English, and not the least the Scottish histories: Not forgetting
this onely by the way, that William the Norman, though a
Conqueror, and not unsworne at his Coronation, was compelld a second time to take oath at S. Albanes, ere the
people would be brought to yeild obedience.

3 Sec. ed. reads: ‘which I instance rather, not because our English
Lawyers have not said the same long before, but because that French Monarchy, is granted by all to be a farr more
absolute then ours.

4 In the sec. ed. the sentence is thus expanded: ‘appealing to the known
constitutions of both the latest Christian Empires in Europe, the Greek and German, besides the French, Italian,
Arragonian, English, and not least, the Scottish Histories.’

3. 1.If men, etc.In this opening paragraph Milton has
in mind all opponents of the Cromwellian party, and especially the Scotch and English Presbyterians.

3. 6.But being slaves within doores. Living under a
domestic tyranny. Alfred Stern (Milton und seine Zeit 1. 438) says that these words will recall to every
reader the conflict between Milton and the Presbyterians over his theory of divorce.

3. 13.Tyrants are not oft offended, etc.Cf. Aristotle,
Politics, 5. 11. 12: ‘Tyrants are always fond of bad men, because they love to be flattered, but no man who
has the spirit of a free man in him will demean himself by flattery.’

3. 15.Them they feare in earnest. Milton probably owes
this thought to George Buchanan. Cf. De Jure Regni apud Scotos. Trans. R. Macfarlan, p. 199: ‘But why should
we look for a surer witness of what tyrants deserve than their own conscience? Hence springs their perpetual fear of
all, and particularly of good men.’ See also Raleigh, The Cabinet-Council (Works, ed. Birch 1. 96): They
[tyrants] are also Protectors of impious Persons, and stand in daily doubt of noble and virtuous Men.

4. 4.Juggl’d and palter’d with the World. A
picturesque phrase insinuating that the Presbyterians, especially their ministers, had played the part of patriots
because it was to their material advantage to do so. Cf. Shak. Macbeth 5.8.20:

Those juggling fiends

That palter with us in a double sense.

4. 4.Bandied. The origin of this word is obscure, but
it is probably derived from the game of tennis, or bandy, meaning to throw or strike a ball from side to side. The
allusion here seems to be to the uncertainty of the Scots in their relation to Charles I. First they were against him,
then for him, then they sold him to the English Parliament and finally they cried up loyalty and obedience. Cf.
Observ. Art. Peace (Bohn. 2. 195): Conspiring and bandying against the common good.’

4. 8.And their pamphlets. A flood of pamphlets greeted
Charles’ attempts to force ritualism upon Scotland. On March 30, 1640, the king issued a proclamation against
‘libellous and seditious Pamphlets and Discourses from Scotland.’ The authors are called ‘factious spirits, and such as
do endeavour to cast most unjust and false aspersions and scandals upon His Majesty and His Government, and upon his
proceedings with his subjects in Scotland, and to distemperate and alienate from His Majesty the hearts of his
well-affected subjects, and such as are in no way inclined to such seditious and disloyal courses.’ For full text of
this proclamation see John Rushworth, Hist. Collections 3. 1094. During the course of the war sermons
continued to be preached against Charles and thousands of pamphlets by Presbyterian and Independent writers poured from
the press.

4. 8.To the ingaging of. By these actions and
utterances the Presbyterians had pledged themselves to an anti-royalist policy.

4. 16.Counted them accessory. The King loved neither
the Presbyterians nor the Independents. For three years (1646-1649) he tried to play off one party against the other.
Before his flight from Oxford to the Scottish camp at Newcastle he expressed the hope that he should be able so to draw
the Presbyterians or the Independents to side with him for extripating one the other, that he should really be king
again. (See his letter to Lord Digby, dated March 26, 1646. Quoted by Masson, Life of Milton 3. 497). Charles
hated the Covenant, steadfastly refused to sign it, and looked upon the Presbyterians as rebels who had broken statutes
and laws pledging them to obedience to their king. Cf. a similar statement in First Def. (Bohn 1. 192).

4. 17.Those Statutes and Laws. At this time the
Presbyterian preachers and writers were constantly accusing the Independents of breaking ‘the Oaths of Allegiance and
Supremacy, the Common Law, Stat. 25. Edw. 3. and all other Acts concerning Treason.’ (See Walker, Hist. of
Independency, pt. 2, p. 69).

4. 22.For a flash, hot and active. Milton grants that
the Presbyterians were active in the good cause for a time. He ascribes their defection to (1) sloth, (2) inconstancy,
(3) cowardice, (4) falsehood, or (5) wickedness.

4. 23.Inconstancie, and weakness of spirit. Clarendon
supports Milton in his indictment of the Scots and Presbyterian party for fickleness and failure to carry out their
policy to its end. See his Hist. of the Rebellion. Ed. Machray, bk. 10. 168 ff.

5. 4.Customes. Milton had no sympathy with irrational
customs. Cf. his attack on prejudices and customs in Areop. (Bohn 2. 98): ‘Our eyes, bleared and dimmed with
prejudice and custom.’

5. 5.Their gibrish Lawes. Alluding to the jargon in
which statutes were written. A variant form of gibber is jabber, to talk nonsense. Gibberish is therefore
unintelligible speech, inarticulate chatter.

Under the heading Leges in his Commonplace Book Milton says, ‘Alfred turn’d the old laws into
English. I would he liv’d now to rid us of this Norman gibbrish.’ (See Publication of Camden Society for 1876, p.
22).

In 1650 Parliament ordered that all the books of the laws be put into English; and that all writs, processes,
indictments, records, and all rules and proceedings in courts of justice be in the English tongue only, and not in
Latin or French, or any other language but English. It is possible that Milton’s protest and personal influence may
have contributed to this result.

5. 12.They plead for him, pity him, extoll him,
etc.London and Lancashire ministers sent in protests against the policy of Parliament towards the king. Letters
were addressed to Lord Fairfax and the army by Dr. Henry Hammond and Dr. Gauden. The indefatigable William Prynne, both
in Parliament and out, was busy with tongue and pen in pleading the king’s cause. As a sample of these protests see the
Declaration and Protestation of Will: Pryn, and Clem: Walker, issued Jan. 19, 1649, against the proposal of
the House of Commons to bring the king to capital punishment. Prynne and Walker declare that such a course is ‘highly
impious against the Law of God, Nations, and the Protestant Profession, Traitors against the State, of Treason, 25 Edw.
3., and against all Laws and our Statutes, perjurious and perfidious, against all Oaths of Allegiance, Supremacy,
Nationall Covenant, and Protestation; all the Parliaments Declarations and Remonstrances held forth to the world; their
Treaties and promises made to the Scots when they delivered the King’s Person into our hands; against our
promises made to the Hollanders, and other Nations, and against all the Professions, Declarations,
Remonstrances, and Proposals made by this Army; when they made their Addresses to the King at New-Market, Hampton
Court, and other places.’ (Walker, Hist. of Independency, pt. 2, p. 83).

5. 13.Protest against those, etc.The Presbyterian
minsters of London in their vindication set forth: ‘For when we did first engage with the Parliament, (which we did not
till called thereunto) we did it with loyal hearts and affection towards the King, and his posterity. Not intending the
least hurt to his Person, but to stop his party from doing further hurt to the Kingdome; not to bring his Majesty to
justice (as some now speak) but to put him into a better capacity to doe justice.’ (A Vindication of the London
Ministers from the unjust aspersions upon their former actings for the Parliament, p. 3).

5. 25.They themselves have cited him. Milton refers to
a treatise, Truths Manifest, said by him to have been written by a Scotchman, ‘in which it is affirmed that
there hath been more Christian blood shed by the commission, approbation, and connivance of King Charles and his
father, James, in the latter end of their reign, than in the ten Roman persecutions.’ See Eikon (Bohn 1. 383).
For a comparison of Charles with Nero see ibid.

5. 29.Nero, Claudius ( 54-68). Milton relates that the
Senate required that Nero should be stripped naked, and hung by the neck upon a forked stake, and whipped to death. Cf.
First Def. (Bohn 1. 133): ‘Consider now, how much more mildly and moderately the English dealt with their
tyrant, though many are of opinion, that he caused the spilling of more blood than even Nero himself did.’

5. 33.Agag. Agag was a king of the Amalekites,
conquered by Saul and, contrary to the divine command, saved alive, but put to death by Samuel. (1 Sam. 15). Milton is
here comparing the compassion of the Presbyterian party with that of Saul who was disobedient to God’s command.

5. 34.Many Jonathans, that have sav’d Israel. A
comparison of the Puritan generals with Jonathan, who led a forlorn hope against a great army of Philistines, and freed
his country from invasion. The allusion is to one of the most stirring war stories of the Old Testament (1 Sam.
13).

6. 1.Clause of their Covnant wrested. With the mention
of the Covenant Milton touches upon one of the leading topics of this pamphlet. For a full discussion of the Covenant,
and what was to Milton the unnecessariest and riddling clause, see Introd.

6. 4.But not scrupling, etc.It is difficult to arrive
at the meaning of this ambiguous statement. In return for compliments from the king, for his good opinion of their
loyalty, the Scots would not scruple to give over to his implacable revenge, if he should succeed in regaining the
throne, the heads of many thousand Christians more, meaning the Republicans who were still opposing him. To save one
man, the Presbyterians would sacrifice the lives of thousands. This seems to be the leading thought in this obscure
sentence.

6. 7.Another sort there is. Milton now turns his
attention to the weak-kneed conservatives of his own party. He is glancing at Gen. Fairfax, Ald. Pennington and others,
who grew timid at the very last. The trial of the king was carried forward by such Independent army leaders as
Cromwell, Harrison and Ireton, but the great bulk of the party shuddered at the task of bringing Charles to justice. On
Dec. 23, 1648, the House passed a resolution appointing a committee to consider how to proceed in a way of justice
against the king and other capital offenders. ‘Though the Resolution passed without a division, the reluctance of some
who were present had appeared in the course of the debate. They argued that there was no precedent in History for the
judicial trial of a King, and that if the Army were determined that Charles should be punished capitally, the business
should be left to the Army itself as an exceptional and irregular power’ (Masson, Life of Milton 3. 699). Of
the 135 Judicial Commissioners appointed by the House to try the King not half the number attended any of the meetings.
Fairfax was present at the first sitting of the Commission but never went back. Many more withdrew before the trial was
concluded. Milton is writing to encourage these half-hearted Independents, who swerve and shiver, to execute justice,
even upon their King, ‘with just and faithful expedition.’

6. 13.Presidents. Precedents. Buchanan also expresses
his impatience with those who call for precedents. He denies that whatever is not ordained by some law, or evidenced by
some illustrious record, should be instantly reckoned wicked and nefarious (George Buchanan, De Jure Regni apud
Scotos, p. 176).

6. 22.In the glorious way, etc.For a more extended
eulogy of the work of the Long Parliament see Apol. Smec. (Bohn 3. 149). Milton’s praise of the campaigns of
Cromwell was amplified afterwards in his First Def. (Bohn 1. 143); see also Eikon (Bohn 3. 498 ff.),
and Sec. Def. (Bohn 6. 317).

6. 28.Any new Apostate Scar-crowes. A caustic
reference to one of the most interesting figures of the age, the irrepressible pamphleteer, William Prynne (1600-1669).
Milton calls him a scarecrow, for his ears had been mutilated twice because he had persisted in sending out pamphlets
attacking prelacy. He was also branded on both cheeks with the letter S for schismatic. In later years, when he was a
popular hero and sat in the House of Commons, he wore a cap to cover his disfigurement. Milton was not the first writer
to charge Prynne with being an apostate. He was so called in a pamphlet entitled Prynne against Prynne,
published as a reply to Prynne’s Brief Memento. Prynne replied to this charge on the very day of its
publication Jan. 29, 1648, in a broadside: Prynne the Member, reconciled to Prynne, the Barrister. Hitherto
the most outspoken critic of prelacy and royalty, Prynne had become the most active pamphleteer of the Presbyterian
party. He declared that the General, and General Council of Officers of the Army, were ‘the greatest Apostates and
Renegadoes from our publick trust and duties’ (See his Speech made in the House of Commons, Dec. 4, 1648, p.
6. London, 1649). In the same publication we have his apology for his later position. He recites the story of his
sufferings and imprisonments and asserts that he has never received any reward from anyone for his services to the
public, that he has never published any books to scandalise or defame the king, or to alienate the people’s affections
from him. Yet he says, ‘I am clear of opinion that Kings are accountable for their Actions to their Parliaments and
whole kingdoms.’ In case of absolute necessity he would even allow the deposition of a tyrant, ‘if there be no speciall
oaths nor obligations to the contrary (which is our present case).’ Ibid. p. 29. He is here pleading for the
observance of ‘the unnecessariest clause of the Covenant,’ the great argument of the Presbyterians, which Milton
despises as a quibble.

For another attack of Milton upon Prynne, see To Rem. Hire (Bohn 3. 17).

6. 31.The spleene of a frustrated Faction. This biting
phrase hits off the situation exactly. The Presbyterian pamphlets of Prynne, Walker, and the London divines are full of
spleen. It was a bitter disappointment to the party, which had hoped to see the Presbyterian system of intolerant
church government established in England, to be outmanœuvred and crushed by the Independents in the House with the army
at their back.

7. 1.Those Statutes and Scriptures . . . they
wrest, etc.This was a common practice among the controversialists of Milton’s day. All arguments were
supported by appeals to law or to the Bible. But the freedom of private interpretation, established by the Protestant
Reformation, gave rise to all kinds of differences over ambiguous texts. To ‘wrest’ a text against an opponent was a
proof of literary skill. Milton himself was guilty of this art; he was an adept in citing Scripture for his purpose, as
may be seen in this very pamphlet. See Introd.

In Ref. in Eng. (Bohn 2. 404) he uses an analogous phrase: Wrenching and spraining the text.

7. 3.Their Friends and Associates. The army and the
Independents. For the moment Milton uses a milder tone. He reminds all critics of the parliament that the tyrant is
after all the common foe. If the king is restored to power, he will revenge himself on both Presbyterians and
Independants. Cf. 2. 19, 4. 17. He sounds this warning note repeatedly in this pamphlet, also in First Def.
(Bohn 3. 194): ‘Wo be to you in the first place, if Charles’ posterity recover the crown of England; assure yourselves,
you are like to be put in the black list.’

Henry Hammond, D. D. (1605-1660). Hammond was not only a great scholar and preacher, but a devoted royalist. He
acted for some years as chaplain to Charles, and accompanied him from place to place during his imprisonment by
parliament. He was much beloved by the king, who said he was the most natural orator he ever heard. He was a noted
theologian and exegete. His most famous works were his Practical Catechism and his Paraphrase and
Annotations on the New Testament. Owing to the fact that he was a personal friend of Fairfax, and of other
officers of the army, he made a last effort to save his master by addressing to them a letter on behalf of Charles.
Hammond was a man of great piety, learning, and benevolence, and was altogether undeserving of Milton’s sneer.
Hammond’s letter was written Jan. 15, 1648, and its published title is as follows: To the Right Honourable, the
Lord Fairfax, and his Councell of Warre, the Humble Addresse of Henry Hammond (London, 1649). The writer advises
the army officers to test all motives by the true Spirit of God and the Scriptures, not by lying spirits; not to be too
sure that God has borne testimony to the justice of their cause by the many victories He has given to them, for the
Mahommedans were successful in war, and God often permits His people to suffer defeat. By shedding the king’s blood
they will only fill up the measure of the nation’s iniquities and provoke the wrath of God. He concludes by saying that
he will intercede daily at the throne of grace that God will mollify their hearts towards the king, or else interpose
His hand to rescue his royal person out of their power.

Milton entertained a very poor opinion of chaplains. Cf. To Rem. Hire (Bohn 3. 35) and Rem. Def.
(Bohn 3. 47). For his animus against chaplains in general, and a special diatribe against Dr. Hammond as king’s
chaplain, see Eikon (Bohn 1. 458 ff.).

John Gauden, D. D., Bishop of Worcester (1605-1662), at first sympathized with the parliamentary cause, but began to
have misgivings as the struggle progressed. Although he subscribed to the Covenant, he published in 1643, Certain
Scruples and Doubts of Conscience about taking the Solemn League and Covenant. As time passed he grew still more
reactionary, and finally at the Restoration was made chaplain to the king and appointed to the bishopric of Exeter, and
later to that of Worcester. The celebrated book, which appeared the day after Charles’ execution, entitled Εἰϰὼν
βασιλιϰὴ; the Pourtraiture of His Sacred Majestie in His Solitudes and Sufferings, has been attributed to Dr.
Gauden on very strong grounds. This book, which went through forty-seven editions, called forth a reply from Milton,
his Eikon. (1649).

The letter here criticised by Milton bore the following title: The Religious and Loyal Protestation of John
Gauden, Dr. in Divinity against the Declared Purposes and Proceedings of the Army and others; about the trying and
destroying our Sovereign Lord the King (London, Jan. 5, 1648). In this letter Gauden warns Fairfax and the army
officers against the perils of success and prosperous power. He calls the king their ‘Mistaken Parent.’ He appeals to
the officers not to forget the common Errours to which all men are subject. ‘O stain not the Renown of your valour by
so mercilesse an Act, as the destroying your King.’ In his final exhortation he speaks of the day, ‘When the world
shall see your power bounded with Loyalty, sanctified with Pitty, not foolish and feminine, which I would have below
you, but masculine, Heroick, truly Christian and Divine,’ etc. This letter is highly rhetorical and in the last period
the author, with his talk of feminine and masculine, gave Milton his idea for ‘the unmasculine Rhetorick of any puling
Priest or Chaplain.’

7. 15.Self-repugnance of our dancing Divines.
Repugnant to themselves, self-contradictory. In the contemptuous epithet Milton is probably insinuating that the
Presbyterian ministers were under the influence of a nervous disease epidemic in the sixteenth century, known as the
dancing malady. The meaning may be, however, that they danced to different kinds of music; yesterday they were against
the king, today they support him.

7. 17.Gloss’d and fitted for thir turnes. He reverts
to the thought that his opponents wrest Scripture to their turnes or purposes. A gloss is a comment or
explanation upon a word or passage in the text. Cf. Sam. Agon. 1. 948: ‘Bearing my words and doings to the
lords, To gloss upon, and censuring frown or smile.’

7. 23.Classic and Provinciall Lords. Under the
Presbyterian form of church government in England there were instituted Classical, Provincial, and National Assemblies,
corresponding to the three modern Presbyterian church courts, the Presbytery, the Synod, and the General Assembly. When
the Westminster Assembly drew up a frame of Presbyterian church-government for England in May, 1645, they provided that
the ecclesiastical provinces should be about sixty in number. The number of Classes or Presbyteries in London were to
be fourteen. The meetings of the twelve London Presbyteries and the two Presbyteries of the Inns of Court were called
Classical Meetings. In his stinging sonnet, On the Forcers of Conscience, Milton speaks of the Presbyterian
divines as ‘a Classic Hierarchy.’ For a full description of the establishment of the Presbyterian system in England see
W. A. Shaw, Hist. of the Eng. Church, 1640-1660, vol. 2, pp. 1-174. See also Masson, Life of Milton
3. 397, 424 and 469.

7. 24.While pluralities greas’d them thick and deepe.
Milton repeats this charge in Sec. Def. (Bohn 1. 268) with more detail. See also First Def. (Bohn 1.
26): ‘As soon as the bishops, and those clergymen whom they daily inveighed against, and branded with the odious names
of pluralists and non-residents, were taken out of their way, they presently jump, some into two, some into three, of
their best benefices; being now warm themselves, they soon unworthily neglected their charge.’ Cf. To Rem.
Hire (Bohn 3. 31). For further discussion of this subject see Introd. p. 26 ff.

7. 33.Censorious domineering. Not an untruthful
description of the heat and dogmatism of divines on political measures. Matters before parliament were fully discussed
in the pulpits.

When the Independents secured a majority in the House of Commons they dealt a blow at their Presbyterian opponents
by ordering on March 26, 1649, that no ministers should teach in their pulpits anything relating to state affairs, but
only to preach Christ in sincerity. On July 9 of the same year, parliament declared all ministers delinquents, if they
preached or prayed against the government, publicly mentioned Charles or James Stuart, or refused to keep days of
public humiliation, or to publish acts and orders of parliament. See Gardiner, Hist. of C. W. and Protectorate
1. 191.

7. 34.Truth and conscience to be freed.
Presbyterianism was intolerant of other sects, but the Independents granted liberty of conscience to all except
atheists and Papists. Even Richard Baxter, the saintliest of all Presbyterians of his time, would have enslaved truth
and conscience. In his sketch of the ideal commonwealth he lays down the principle that none are to be electors, but
those who have publicly owned the Baptismal Covenant, in other words those who are Presbyterian church members in good
standing. Those who despise public worship are to be deprived of the right to vote, and ministers of the church are to
be able to disfranchise members by excommunicating them (See Baxter, A Holy Commonwealth, or Political Aphorisms
opening the True Principles of Government, p. 247). Toleration was denounced by the Presbyterian synod at Sion
College in 1645 as ‘a root of gall and bitterness both in present and future ages.’ The same decision was reached by
the ministers of Lancashire, a section where Presbyterianism was particularly strong. They declared that toleration was
the taking away of all conscience, the appointing of a city of refuge in men’s consciences for the devil to fly to.
Neale, Hist. of Puritans 2. 382.

The sprightly Edwards has no hesitation in affirming that ‘A toleration is the grand design of the devil.’ He
declares that more books have been written and sermons preached on toleration during the last four years (1642-1646)
than on any other subject (Gangræna, 1. 3. 121, 122).

For a previous utterance of Milton in behalf of liberty of conscience see Areop. (Bohn 2. 92): ‘Under these
fantastic terrors of sect and schism, we wrong the earnest and zealous thirst after knowledge and understanding, which
God hath stirred up in this city.’ See also his sonnet to Cromwell,

New foes arise

Threatening to bind our souls with secular chains

Help us to save free conscience from the paw

Of hireling wolves, whose gospel is their maw.

Cf. also his vigorous handling of the intolerants in the poem on The New Forcers of Conscience with its
famous closing line,

The actual origin of the payment of tithes is unknown. They were probably paid to the medieval monasteries as
oblations. The first legislative action on the subject was taken in the reign of Edward I who ordered that a tenth of
the value of the crops should be paid to support the church. Landowners alone were subject to this tax. The law could
be enforced by distress and by sale, or by order of a Justice of the Peace. See F. A. Inderwick, The
Interregnum, John Selden, Hist. of Tythes, pp. 47-53, also W. Bohun, The Law of Tithes,
passim.

As Milton indicates, the Independent party in parliament had an idea of abolishing tithes and providing some
competent maintenance for a preaching ministry. Several attempts were made in this direction, but the Commonwealth was
really too poor to establish any satisfactory new method. The Presbyterian ministers were naturally averse to any
prohibitory legislation regarding tithes, for they had followed their prelatical predecessors in upholding their right
to this ancient source of revenue. ‘The Presbyterians preach for their god, viz. the tenth of every man’s estates, and
for forms,’ says Whitelocke, Memorials 2. 488. Cf. W. A. Shaw, Hist. Eng. Church 2. 255 ff.

Milton denounces tithes in To Rem. Hire., passim.

7. 34.Pluralities. As early as 1642 the House of
Commons recommended five bills to the king as the ground of a treaty. One of these was ‘An act against the enjoying
pluralities of benefices by spiritual persons, and nonresidence.’ But the king refused to come to terms and the bill
was therefore not passed. On Nov. 8, 1647, a proposition against pluralities was agreed to by both Houses of Parliament
(Neale, Hist. of the Puritans 2. 53. Pluralities were never legislated out of existence, however.

[Warme Experience of large gifts.]When ministers preached before
parliament, or sat on commissions, they were liberally paid. In March, 1650, an order was passed to send over six able
ministers to preach in Dublin. They were to have £200 per annum apiece out of bishops’ and deans’ and chapters’ lands
in Ireland.

8. 3.To exclude and seize on impeach’t Members. On
June 14, 1647, the Army sent forth a remonstrance in which they impeached eleven Presbyterian leaders of the Commons,
Holles, Stapleton, Waller, Glynn, Massey, etc. and demanded their exclusion from parliament. When the army marched
against London nine fled to the continent. Glynn and Maynard, who remained behind, were impeached and sent to the
Tower, Sept. 7, 1647.

8. 4.Delinquents. Milton has the king in mind as the
chief delinquent. The preamble to an ordinance passed by parliament, April 1, 1643, sets forth ‘that it is most
agreeable to common justice that the estates of such notorious delinquents as have been the causes or instruments of
the public calamities, should be converted and applied towards the support of the Commonwealth.’ On August 19, 1643,
this ordinance was further explained, as including in the number of delinquents such as absented from their usual
places of abode or betook themselves to the king’s forces, and such as concealed effects, evaded taxes or disobeyed
parliament’s orders in various ways. See Neale, Hist. of the Puritans 1. 453.

8. 6.Corah, Dathan and Abiram. Korah
conspired with Dathan and Abiram against Moses and Aaron. See Num. 16. Milton refers to the language of the Sion tract
(see below 53. 14): ‘You know the sad examples of Corah, Dathan and Abiram in their mutinuous Rebellion, and Levelling
designe against Magistracy and Ministry, in the persons of Moses and Aaron’ (A Serious and Faithful Representation
of the Judgment of the Ministers of the Gospel within the Province of London, signed by forty-seven ministers at
Sion College, including Case, Gataker, Gower, Roborough, and Wallis, of the Westminster Assembly, and addressed to
Fairfax and the Council of War, Jan. 18, 1649, p. 10).

8. 7.A cursed Tyrant, etc.On the preaching of
seditious sermons by the ministers of the time, and by Stephen Marshall in particular, see Clarendon, Hist. of the
Rebellion, 6. 39 ff., also Robt. Barclay, The Inner Life of the Religious Societies of the Commonwealth, p.
186. Stephen Marshall preached before Commons, Feb. 23, 1641: ‘He is a cursed man that withholds his hands from
shedding of blood, or that shall do it fraudulently, i. e., kill some and save some. If he go not through with the
work, he is a cursed man, when this is to be done on Moab, the enemy of God’s church.’ Another divine, named Case,
preaching to the Commons on Jer. 48. 10, said: ‘Cursed be he that withholdeth his sword from blood, that spares when
God saith strike, that suffers those to escape whom God hath appointed to destruction’; to the Commons on Nov. 5, 1644,
he said: ‘Do justice to the greatest. Saul’s sons are not to be spared; no, nor may Agag, nor Benhadad, tho’ themselves
kings: Timri and Cosbi, though princes of the people, must be pursued unto their tents. This is the way to consecrate
yourselves to God.’ A Royalist writer says, ‘The pulpit sounded as much as the drum, and the preacher spit as much
flame as the cannon. Curse ye Meroz, was the text, and blood and plunder, the comment and the use’ (A Loyal Tear, a
Sermon on Sin, p. 30).

Price declares that the London ministers have changed front towards Charles, ‘whom your selves and the Church of
Scotland have charged for the greatest Delinquent, guilty of the blood of hundreds of thousands of Protestants, the
bloudiest man under heaven’ (Clerico-Classicum, p. 23).

Whitelocke tells the story of a Scotch minister, who preached boldly before the king at Newcastle, and after his
sermon called for the 52nd Psalm, which begins, ‘Why dost thou, tyrant, boast thyself thy wicked works to praise?’
(Memor. 2. 94).

The king himself denounced the Presbyterian ministers as being ignorant in learning, turbulent and seditious in
disposition, scandalous in life, unconformable to the laws of the land, libellers both of church and state, and
preachers of sedition and treason itself. See Neale, Hist. of Puritans 2. 426.

8. 10.Though nothing penitent or alter’d. To the last
Charles refused to subscribe to the Solemn League and Covenant. Through all his negotiations with the Scots and with
the English House of Commons, he continually spoke of the royal prerogative and endeavored to make a proviso for the
partial establishment of episcopacy. The king was too firm a believer in divine right to be penitent for his past
conduct, and too stubborn to relinquish his first principles. Cf. Eikon (Bohn 1. 474): ‘His impenitence and
obstinacy to the end.’

8. 25.The people, though in number lesse by many. An
obscure statement. The majority of the representatives in parliament must be reckoned for the whole people. Robt.
Filmer so understands this sentence. See his Observations concerning the Original of Government, p. 19.

8. 29.If such a one there be. For another arraignment
of the king see First Def. (Bohn 1. 59). A committee of the House of Commons drew up a declaration against the
king ‘wherein they objected many high crimes against him concerning his Father’s death, the loss of Rochel and the
Massacre and Rebellion in Ireland.’ Walker, Hist. of Indep., p. 73. See also The Act for, Trial of the
King, Walker, ib. p. 57.

8. 30.Whole massachers have been committed, etc. The
Irish insurrection and massacres of Protestants took place in 1641. When the news reached England the nation was
horrified. The wildest stories were soon retailed in pamphlet form regarding the awful sufferings of the Protestants.
The lowest calculation of contemporary writers gives an estimate of 30,000 English and Scotch Protestants as victims.
Gardiner is of opinion, however, that those slain in cold blood at the beginning of the rebellion could hardly have
exceeded four or five thousand, whilst about twice that number may have perished from ill-treatment (Hist. of
Engl. (1603-1642), 10. 69). In his Eikon. (Bohn 1. 407 ff.), where Milton devotes a whole chapter to the
subject, he puts the number of slain at 154,000 in the province of Ulster alone, and estimates the total sum as four
times as great. In Observ. Art. Peace (Bohn 2. 183) he places the figure at more that 200,000. In First
Def. (Bohn 1. 201) he calls Charles a murderer, by whose order the Irish took arms, and put to death with most
exquisite torments above a hundred thousand Englishmen. In his Observ. Art. Peace (Bohn 2. 180) his estimate
is much more moderate. He blames the king for using with tenderness and moderation those bloody rebels after the
merciless and barbarous massacre of so many thousand English.

However uncertain he may be as to the number of the slain, Milton is positive that the king was responsible for the
Irish horror. Parliament was of the same opinion. In a declaration of parliament issued Feb. 15, 1647, the king was
charged with complicity in the Irish massacre, and that he had an agent in Rome to attend to it, for it was to be
managed by direction from the Pope.

Referring to the massacre Baxter says: ‘Because of it all England was filled with a fear both of the Irish and
Papists at home, and when they saw the English Papists join with the King against the Parliament, it was the greatest
thing that ever alienated them from the King’ (Life, Pt. 1, p. 29).

For an examination of the evidence incriminating the king, see Masson, Life 2. 303 ff.; Symmons, Life
of Milton, pp. 256 ff.

8. 31.His Provinces offer’d to pawne or alienation. In
First Def. (Bohn 1. 201) Milton says that Charles sent a private embassy to the King of Denmark to beg
assistance from him of arms, horses, and men, expressly against the parliament. ‘To the English he promised the plunder
of London; to the Scots, that the four northern counties should be added to Scotland, if they would but help him to get
rid of the Parliament, by what means soever. This aid was coming, when Divine Providence, to divert them, sent a sudden
torrent of Swedes into the bowels of Denmark.’ See Eikon. (Bohn 1. 390). Again we read that the king’s letters
taken at the battle of Naseby ‘revealed his endeavours to bring in foreign forces, Irish, French, Dutch, Lorraines and
our old invaders the Danes upon us’ (ib. 1. 453). So much for Milton’s testimony. Gardiner states that Charles
appealed for aid from the Pope, from the Duke of Lorraine, begging him to lead an army into England, and from the
German princes. In order to obtain the services of Count Waldemar and his army of mercenaries, he tried to obtain a
loan of £50,000 from Amsterdam merchants, pledging the Scilly Islands as security for the repayment of the moncy
(Hist. of the Civil War and Protectorate 1. 223). The King and Queen Henrietta Maria hoped to obtain aid from
the King of Denmark. On April 11, 1642, the Queen wrote to Christian IV, and it was suspected by parliament that a
bribe was offered. Agents of the king were also sent to Denmark, but what proposition was made is unknown. At any rate,
it was unsuccessful. See Gardiner, Hist. of Eng. 10. 188.

8. 31.Alienation. Barclay, one of the extreme
advocates of the doctrine of the divine right of kings, admits that if a king alienates the kingdom, or brings it into
subjection to another, he forfeits it (De Regno et Regum Potestate adversus Monarchomachos 4. 16). In
Observ. Art. Peace (Bohn 2. 182), Milton accuses Charles of alienating and acquitting the whole province of
Ireland from all true fealty and obedience to the Commonwealth of England. Parliament declared that Charles was guilty
in that he had given away more than five counties to the Irish rebels, ‘that Irish Popish army raised by Earl of
Strafford to reduce the kingdomes.’ (Declaration of Parliament, in Civil War Tracts, Yale University
Library, Vol. 21).

9. 34.The Sword of Justice is above him. Did Milton
find a pattern for this phrase in Christopher Goodman’s book, How Imperial Powers ought to be Obeyd, etc. p.
184: ‘Be he Kinge, Quene or Emperour he must dye the death’? See below, 60. 21. Cf. the eloquent apostrophe to Justice
in Eikon. (Bohn 1. 484): ‘She it is, who accepts no person, and exempts none from the severity of her
stroke.’

9. 2.So great a deluge of innocent blood. Milton and
his party blamed Charles Stuart ‘that man of blood,’ for all the effusion of blood in the Civil War. In Eikon.
(Bohn 1. 388 ff.) Milton gives a stern reply to the question asked by the author of Eikon Basilike, ‘Whose
innocent blood he hath shed, what widows’ or orphans’ tears can witness against him?’ See also 5. 28.

8. 12.For if all humane power to execute, etc. Is this
a comment on Calvin’s teaching? He advises passive obedience in the presence of the most cruel tyranny, but holds out a
hope that God will execute his wrath upon the offending king. ‘For sometimes he raises up some of his servants as
public avengers, and arms them with his commission to punish unrighteous domination,’ etc. (Institutes 4. 20.
30). See also Rom. 13. 4.

9. 6.Or if that faile, extraordinary. Prynne and
others were questioning the ordinary power of parliament to put the king to death. In this phrase Milton boldly
declares that he would go outside the bounds of precedent or statutory law to punish a tyrant.

9. 16.Not learnt in corners among Schismes and
Herisies. An attempt to anticipate unfavorable criticism. By his divorce pamphlets Milton had earned the
reputation of a heretic. The interjection of this clause shows his sensitiveness to the attacks made upon him. Although
a freethinker, he scarcely enjoyed being called a schismatic or a heretic.

9. 19.Authentic. Gr. αὐϑεντιϰός, warranted. Cf.
Eikon. (Bohn. 1. 485): ‘For it were extreme partiality and injustice, the flat denial and overthrow of
herself, to put her own authentic sword into the hand of an unjust and wicked man,’ etc.

9. 19.No prohibited authors. An allusion to the Church
Fathers, against whose authority Protestant theologians rebelled. Milton himself had little respect for the Fathers. In
a former treatise, Prel. Epis., he had expresses his contempt in these words: ‘They cannot think any doubt
resolved, and any Doctrine confirmed, unless they run to that indigested heap and fry of authors which they call
antiquity. Whatsoever time, or the heedless hand of blind chance hath drawn down from of old to this present, in her
huge drag-net, whether fish, or seaweed, shells or shrubs, unpicked, unchosen, those are the fathers’ (Bohn 2. 422).
Cf. To Rem. Hire. (Bohn 3. 38): ‘The obscure and tangled word of antiquity, fathers and council fighting one
against another.’

9. 20.Orthodoxal. This form is used in Eikon.
(Bohn. 1. 385), and Prel. Epis. (Bohn 2. 428). Milton also used the word paradoxal in To Rem.
Hire. (Bohn 3. 3).

9. 24.All men naturally were borne free. This favorite
modern contention first found formal expression in the work of the Roman jurists who instituted the Justinian Code.
Ulpian, the greatest of these lawyers, declared in treating of slavery that so far as pertains to natural rights, all
men are equal (Digest 50. 17. 32); also by natural law all men are born free (Institutes of Justinian
1. 2. 2); the application of these principles to politics proper, however, dates back to the treatise of Nicholas of
Cues, De Concordantia Catholica, the views of which he presented to the Council of Basel in 1565. Almost the
exact phrases used by Milton are to be found in this influential and learned work. See Dunning, Pol. Theories
Ancient and Mediæval, p. 273. This idea, thus stated by the jurists and by Nicholas of Cues, was given new life by
the author of the famous treatise, Vindiciæ Contra Tyrannos. The author of this revolutionary tract says: ‘Men
are by nature free, impatient of servitude, prone to rule rather than to obey. It can only be for some great benefit
that they renounce the law of their own nature to bear that of another. The inducement was the necessity of security,
when the distinction between meum and tuum was introduced, when fellow-citizens began to quarrel for
property, and neighboring nations for territory; then the people had recourse to a ruler to protect the weaker from the
stronger, the nation from its neighbors’ (Digest by H. Armstrong, Eng. Hist. Rev. 4. 31).

Even the earlier supporters of despotic principles, Barclay and Blackwood, for instance, accepted as a truism the
theory that all men were naturally born free, so that Milton feels quite safe in saying that every educated man will
agree with him on this point. This theory was to be contested, however, by Filmer in his Patriarcha in the
very year this pamphlet was published, and later writers, such as Heylin, Mainwaring, and Hobbes, were to set it at
naught. But the pleasing assumption could not be argued out of existence, and, a century afterwards it found its way
into the Declaration of Independence, and later still provided a favorite text for the orators of the French
Revolution.

In Eikon. (Bohn 1. 455) Milton roundly declares: ‘Men are by naiure free; born and created with a better
title to their freedom than any king hath to his crown.’ See also Ready and Easy Way (Bohn 2. 138).

9. 28.The Root of Adam’s transgression. See the story
of the fall and its consequences, Gen. 3 and 4. Milton has in mind theological refinements on the simple story of
Genesis, especially the doctrine of imputed sin. See his elaboration of this theme in P. L., Book 10.
Augustine, rather than Paul, emphasized the doctrine of imputed guilt, and paved the way for the endless disquisitions
of Calvinists on original sin. Augustine and Gregory the Great were the first Christian teachers to advance the
argument that human government was introduced among men on account of Adam’s transgression. This view was held by the
church until the time of Wycliffe. Thomas Aquinas was probably the first teacher to depart from this belief.

In a pamphlet published anonymously in London in 1644 (Jus Populi, pp. 42, 43) we come upon a passage which
seems almost a paraphrase of Milton’s thought: ‘The nature of Man being depraved by the fall of Adam, miseries of all
sorts broke in upon us in throngs, together with sin; insomuch that no creature is now so uncivile and untame, or so
unfit either to live with or without societie, as Man.’ Todd, in his Life of Milton, pp. 225, 226 (London,
1826), notes this pamphlet, and discusses whether Milton could have written it.

9. 12.They agreed by common league. This is the
political theory made popular in later days by Rousseau and called by him the Contrat Social. For the source
of this interesting idea we must go back to the writings of the stoics. Lord Acton, in his essay entitled History
of Freedom, p. 18, says: ‘The notion that men lived originally in a state of nature, by violence and without laws,
is due to Critias. Communism in its grossest form was recommended by Diogenes of Sinope. According to the Sophists
there is no duty above expediency, and no virtue apart from pleasure. Epicurus said that all societies are founded on
contract, for mutual protection.’

Among the French pamphleteers of the latter half of the sixteenth century, the social contract theory was very
popular. It was such a stock idea that it is impossible to ascribe it to any one individual. It is deliberately made
the foundation-principle upon which the Vindiciæ Contra Tyrannos rests.

Milton’s idea of contract is that power is only temporarily surrendered, and may be recalled when abused. Suarez and
other French theorists held that subjects by compact surrendered their rights once for all, and can never legally
recover them. Thus they justified absolutism. Hobbes also adopted this idea: ‘They that are subjects to a monarch,
cannot without his leave cast off monarchy, and return to the confusion of a disunited multitude’ (Leviathan,
ed Morley, p. 85). It can be seen, therefore, that the ingenuity of the upholders of divine right tried to make even
this democratic doctrine serve their own purposes.

For an exposure of the unhistorical character of this theory, see J. Bluntschli, The Theory of the State,
pp. 276 ff.

[Communicated and deriv’d.]He embodies in this phrase the idea of
give and take. He insists upon the notion of a voluntary league or contract, and the derivative power of kings and
magistrates. Thus the doctrine of the original contract and that of jure divino are placed in opposition.

10. 10.For the eminence of his wisdom and integritie.
Cf. Buchanan, De Jure, p. 99: ‘Now I imagine that the intention of the ancients in creating a king was,
according to what we are told of bees in their hives, spontaneously to bestow the sovereignty on him who was most
distinguished among his countrymen for singular merit, and who seemed to surpass all his fellows in wisdom and equity.’
Although Milton probably transcribed this view from Buchanan, he may have imbibed it from ancient writers, for
Aristotle (Politics, Book 3) and others, following Herodotus, express the same thought. Among ancient writers
Polybius (Book 6, Ch. 1) held that the earliest form of government was monarchy based on force. The early men
submitted, like animals, to the guidance of the strongest and boldest. See Dunning, Pol. Theories, p. 115.

10. 13.Magistrates. Bodin lays down this definition:
‘A magistrate is a publick officer, which hath power to command in a Commonweale’ (De Republica, p. 293).

10. 13.Not to be thir Lords and Maisters. See
Aristotle (Politics 3. 17. 2): ‘It is manifest that, where men are alike and equal, it is neither expedient
nor just that one man should be lord of all, whether there are laws, or whether there are no laws, but he himself is in
the place of law.’ Cf. First Def. (Bohn 1. 66).

10. 26.Arbitrement. The right or capicity to decide
for oneself. Here, free choice. A word rarely used in Milton’s day. Used more frequently since 1830. See P. L.
8. 641:

To stand or fall

Free in thine own Arbitrament it lies.

10. 31.Invent Lawes. In this fanciful sketch Milton
follows Buchanan in this argument: ‘For when kings observed no laws but their capricious passions, and finding their
power uncircumscribed and immoderate, set no bounds to their lusts, and were swayed mueh by favor, much by hatred, and
much by private interest; their domineering insolence excited an universal desire for laws. On this account statutes
were enacted by the people, and kings were in their judicial decisions obliged to adopt not what their own licentious
fancies dictated but what the laws sanctioned by the people ordained’ (De Jure p. 105).

Two theories were then prevalent as to the origin of law. Francis Hotman, in his Franco-Gallia, declares
that law is the result of the gradual growth of custom. The author of Vindiciæ Contra Tyrannos adopted the
theory, which Milton upholds. See also Hooker, Eccles. Polity 1. 10.

Aristotle was probably father of the saying. See Politics 4. 15. 4. In his turn Buchanan wrote: ‘You see,
then, that the magistrate derives his authority from the law, and not the law from the magistrate’ (p. 193). A somewhat
similar maxim is that of Étienne Pasquier in his reply to Macchiavelli’s Prince: ‘Les rois sont faits pour les
peuples, et non les peuples pour les rois’ (Henry Baudrillart, J. Bodin et Son Temps, p. 77).

In the First Def. (Bohn 1. 70) Milton gives a whole page to the amplification of the thought which is here
dismissed in a line. He quotes Pindar, Orpheus, Plato, Aristotle, and Cicero to support the contention that the laws
ought to govern the magistrates, as they do the people. His conclusion is that the institution of magistracy is
jure divino, and the end of it is, that mankind might live under certain laws and be governed by them. See
also Observ. Art. Peace (Bohn 2. 183).

11. 8.Upon these termes and no other. Milton has the
ancient practices of the French nation in mind. In the First Def. (Bohn 1. 107 ff.) he says: ‘For not only
Hottoman [Francis Hotman, author of Franco-Gallia], but Guiccard, a very eminent historian of that nation,
informs us that the ancient records of the kingdom of France testify that the subjects of that nation, upon the first
institution of kingship amongst them, reserved a power to themselves, both of choosing their princes and of deposing
them again, if they thought fit; and that the oath of allegiance, which they took, was upon this express condition: to
wit, that the king should likewise perform what at his coronation he swore to do. So that if kings, by misgoverning the
people committed to their charge, first broke their own oath to their subjects, there needs no pope to dispense with
the people’s oaths; the kings themselves by their own perfidiousness, having absolved their subjects.’

11. 9.Bond or Covnant.Covenant is the
Biblical synonym for bond, or any solemn agreement. In ancient times a covenant was accompanied by a religious
rite. Among the Hebrews the most important covenant was between the people and the Deity. The primitive form of the
rite consisted in cutting sacrificial victims in pieces, between which the contracting parties passed. See Gen. 15. 17;
Jer. 34. 18, 19. There are many instances of covenants in the Old Testament between God and man, and between man and
man. The most celebrated instance of a covenant in modern history is that of the league of the Scots against the
introduction of prelacy. See Introduction.

11. 9.Those Lawes which they the people had themselves made, or
assented to. Cf. Buchanan: ‘Our kings at their public inauguration solemnly promise to the whole people to
observe the statutes, customs, and institutions of our ancestors, and to adhere strictly to that system of
jurisprudence handed down by antiquity. This fact is proved by the whole tenour of the ceremonies at their coronation,
and by their first arrival in our cities. From all these circumstances it may be easily conceived what sort of power
they received from our ancestors, and that it was clearly such as magistrates, elected by suffrage, are bound by oath
not to exceed’ (De Jure, p. 158).

11. 13.Not to be onely at his beck. The king calls
parliament to meet. The Royalists contended that the later sessions of the Long Parliament were illegal, because it
assembled without the king’s consent. Milton argues that, whether with the king or without him, the parliament can meet
to devise ways and means to care for the public safety. He resents the imputation of monarchical writers that the
parliament is the mere creature of the king.

11. 18.Claudius Sesell. Claude de Seyssel (1450 —
1520). For fifty years Seyssel was professor of law in the University of Turin. He was also bishop of Laon, later of
Marseilles, and archbishop of Turin in 1517. He was also one of the most noted diplomats of his time, serving on
various missions for Henry VII and Louis XII. Seyssel was a voluminous author. He translated classical authors and
produced many theological works, but is remembered chiefly for his historical writings, the most important of which was
La Grand’ Monarchie de France (1519, in Latin 1548). He glorifies the régime of Louis XII, absolute
in principle but moderate in practice.

This comparison is repeated in First Def. (Bohn 1. 164), and in Notes on Dr. Griffith’s Sermon
(Bohn 2. 361): ‘Parliaments, which by the law of this land are his bridle; in vain his bridle, if not also his rider.’
For the general thought, the supremacy of parliament to the king, see Eikon. (Bohn 1. 360, 364).

11. 28.German. Bodin, De Republica, pp. 221,
236, supports this appeal to the history of Germany. He states that the sovereignty of the German empire lay in the
hands of ‘three or foure hundred men,’ electors, princes, and ambassadors deputed for the imperial cities.

11. 28.French. See the section entitled Rex Anglicae,
etc. in the Commonplace Book, p. 32: ‘Scotland was at first an elective kingdom for a long time: vide
Hist. Scot. France an elective kingdom either to choose or to depose. Bernard de Gerard, Hist.
France: faut noter che (sic) jusques a Hues Capet, tous les rois de France ont este eleuz par le Francois qui se
reserverent ceste puissance d’elire e bannir e chasser leur rois. — By parliament of three estates, first then found
out, Charles Martel was chosen Prince of the French. Bern. de Gerard, l. 2, p. 109, and Pepin King, l. 3, p. 134.
Afterward Charles the Simple, though of the race of Charles the Great, depos’d and Robert crown’d in his stead by the
French.’

The favorite formula of the pamphleteers was borrowed, not from England, but from Spain. In the words of the
coronation oath administered to Aragonian kings, the people were guaranteed as many rights and more power than the
monarch. It was as follows: ‘Nos que valemos tanto come vos, os hazemos nuestro rey y senor con tal que nos guardeis
nuestros fueros y libertades: y sino, no.’ See Du Hamel, Hist. Constitutionelle de la Monarchie Espagnole 1.
215. Hotman also describes the election, and gives the coronation oath in full (Franco-Gallia, p. 71).

12. 3.William the Norman (1066-1087).In his Hist.
of the Norman Conquest (4. 802 ff.), Freeman makes no mention of the second oath-taking at St. Albans. Either
Milton’s memory or authority was at fault. The statement is repeated, however, in First Def. (Bohn 1. 163):
‘When he broke his word, and the English betook themselves again to their arms, being diffident of his strength, he
renewed his oath upon the Holy Evangelists to observe the ancient laws of England.’